Mom Is Teaching

I’m not going to pretend that I have any clue what-so-ever how a homeschooling parent would teach that previous lesson.  But, I suspect that the method I mentioned might work really great in that matter.  If I were thrown into homeschooling tomorrow, that’s what I would do.  I would go through the map with the child, discussing a little about each state that we might already know or that we can look up and learn.  That way, the child has a better idea of what a state represents other than just a spot on a map.

And, the parent could help the child go through the labeling process with the student reminding them of the small pieces of information that he/she had just learned about each state.  I see this as beneficial because let’s suppose your child lives in Gainesville Florida.  You are homeschooling and you are to this unit.  You 8- year-old has been begging to go snow skiing.  But when you try to explain to him/her that you can’t actually go snow skiing where you live and it is quite a long way to travel in order to do so. 

As you were labeling your map, you could show your child where grandma and grampa live in Nashville Tennessee and also remind them how long it took the last time you drove to see them.  Remind them of the various bathroom stops and the number of miles traveled, etc.  Then, you could jump to Colorado and show them that in order to snow ski they would need to visit a place such as Denver Colorado.  Look what your child has learned and learned the location of:  state of Florida and capital, state of Tennessee and capital and state of Colorado and capital.  The student is so much more likely to remember this because it relates to something the child is already interested in. 

In a classroom setting the teacher could do this as well, the problem being the number of students and the ability to know their students and their likes and dislikes.

In that example, I would be able to teach my child many states and capitals just be using the knowledge they already have and adding to it.  The knowledge is so much more likely to be retained. 

Fast forward 20 years and this young adult still hasn’t been snow skiing but he has won a free airline round trip to anywhere.  He/she knows exactly where he/she wants to go:  Denver Colorado.  And, because you had the opportunity to teach seasons and such, he/she can plan their trip accordingly since he/she learned at a very young age that driving from his/her home in Gainesville Florida to Denver Colorado would probably ruin his trip.

Lesson learned.  No homework.  Child can then be left with blank maps to work through and a labeled map to check his progress.  Learning so much more than simply regurgitating knowledge back onto a piece of paper. 

Discuss.